It’s summer in the USA. Stars and stripes. Bubble guns and pool noodles. Sunscreen is on sale. 9pm sunsets. Beach weather*. Road trips!
*It’s not really braai weather though. The temperature hovers around (an often muggy) 34-36 degrees (Celsius). We keep the braai fires burning high, nonetheless.
The first half of our second summer in the US has been packed with summer camp, plenty of pool time, fun with friends, 4th of July celebrations and a spur of the moment road trip that covered seven states in one week.
School’s out for a long (long) time, so kids can attend summer camps of all shapes and sizes: there’s dance camp and vacation Bible school and adventure camp and every sports camp you can think of. “Camp” is basically the collective noun for structured supervision for kids over the summer. Mostly there’s no actual camping (as in tents and mosquito repellent) for the younger kids. X-man chose Taekwondo camp. No surprise here – he’s been passionate about martial arts as long as he can remember and our Taekwondo school has been a gift to our lives.
When my husband announced that he had to travel for the 3rd time in a three week period I was a little grumpy. On Thursday he suggested that he could drive to his meetings in DC and NYC instead of fly and we could tag along.
On Friday we did the planning. On Saturday we did the packing. On Sunday we hit the road. By the following Sunday, we had driven through 7 states, including NC, VA, WV, PA, NY, DC, MD.
First stop: Washington DC
The best word to describe downtown DC is impressive. There’s so much “United States” to take in. It’s the nation’s capital and one of the most powerful places in the world. You get a sense of bravery, sacrifice, triumph and a scale of achievement that is rather aspirational considering the time it was achieved in (compared to Germany or Britain). There’s something about DC that makes you want to be American…
Taking the kids to Washington DC was definitely on the USA bucket list for me. There is so much to do and see. It’s walkable, child friendly and most of the attractions and museums are completely free!
The National Museum of Natural History was a four hour adventure. My kids loved the dinosaurs, bones, rocks and gems. Xman the science guy loved playing geologist, studying rock formations under a microscope and was very happy to hear that he could become a geologist when he grows up! A fun side-effect of looking at a lot of diamonds and gemstones meant that for the rest of the week, Xman counted everything in “carrots” (carats)! Little Babybelle loved the animals and shrieked with joy when she spotted a hippo 🙂
The Spy Museum (not free) was a huge treat for Xman, whose other obsession is anything to do with “agents”. We may or may not have driven** past the CIA’s offices. (Did you know they have a Facebook check-in?) We also took a nervous family selfie outside the FBI.
We spent a lot of time just walking, chasing squirrels, drinking all the water from the fountains and people watching on park benches under huge leafy trees.
We spotted “agents” and tried to find the entrance to the “secret underground tunnels”, counting security cameras as we walked. We walked from the museum to see The Lincoln memorial, the WW2 memorial, and almost reached the Washington memorial, but by that time the kids were tired. While waiting for hubby to pick us up***, we hung out with the mama duck and her ducklings swimming in the Reflecting Pool. Kudos to DC tourism: my daughter spotted the ducks on the map and insisted on visiting them. The ducks were exactly where the map said they’d be! (Haha) We spotted the White House in the distance and waved** (too close to dinner time and driving by** the White House isn’t possible).
**Drive-by’s and spot-and-waves became a signature of this trip. Sometime it is just a lot more pleasant and less stressful to see the sights from the comfort of our air conditioned car!
***Poor guy had to endure a number of horrible traffic scenes to pick up his family in fun and exciting places on his way back from the office.
Next stop: Long Island
The timing of Counting Crows’ “It’s raining in Baltimore” was perfect and also a little prophetic, as 15 minutes out, it started raining. Warnings of a big storm somewhere close to New Jersey on Twitter and ominous clouds looming on the horizon didn’t worry us. Saffas don’t melt in the rain. It was when the radio started crackling in a War of the Worlds style message urging us to “Take Shelter Now” that we realized we could be heading for trouble. We were on a bridge at the time.
The wind, rain and lightning was scary. It was so crazy that the kids built a fort in the back seat. Nevertheless, we soldiered on. There weren’t a lot of cars on our side of the highway. We thought that was pretty lucky. We didn’t realize how lucky we were until we saw trees uprooted and strewn on the side of the road for miles and miles and the other side of the interstate closed because of too much debris and a fallen tree. We were chasing a tornado all along! We had a second lucky escape on the way home out of NYC when we took the wrong turn-off and ended up driving home via Pennsylvania, missing another tornado 🙂
The fort. The kids are hiding under a big green blanket.
Twitter confirms it!
The other side of the interstate blocked by a tree.
After the crazy walking we did in DC and our eventful drive, I decided the weather was perfect for 2 days hanging out at the hotel pool. (So much interesting people watching here! Some parts of Long Island is the 90s frozen in time, complete with guys who look like Joey Tribbiani and girls with scrunchies).
The City
My first experience of NYC was love at first sight. You can read about that trip here. Seeing the city with two kids in tow means you get to see a whole different side of New York. We walked and walked. We discovered some amazing playgrounds. We drank incredible coffee. We ate dodgy Chinese food and a dirty water hot dog. We walked some more. We made New York smile by buying our 2,5 year old an ice cream as big as her head and letting her enjoy it as we strolled.
We also tried to get on the subway at Grand Central Station at 6pm on a Friday with two kids and a stroller. Rookie mistake. Not recommended. The terminals at Grand Central Station are nuts at rush hour. Next time we’re taking taxis. Thank goodness we had a car. On our last day in the city we drove through Times Square, Downtown and Chinatown.
Times Square traffic
Baby girl having an epic wobbly on a New York sidewalk. Don’t think anyone noticed.
Awful traffic leaving New York
But in all seriousness, New Yorkians, I really need to know:
1. How on earth do bike messengers survive if they try to fly their bikes over the cars?
2. What is up with the grumpy little Asian ladies? They are tremendously intimidating. Even if they are 90 years old. They walk incredibly fast in the tiniest of steps. Arms folded. Often mumbling. Carrying huge bags. I got the impression that if you do not get out of their way on the sidewalk, you’ll get knocked out. Please explain.
TTFN.
A little big adventure. 
Great blog!